Lionel Messi insisted it was only right that so many of his Barcelona team-mates dominated the voting at the Ballon d’Or after the Argentina star scooped this year’s award.

Messi beat last year’s winner Cristiano Ronaldo into second place in the poll for Europe’s footballer of the year by a record margin.

The 22-year-old polled 473 votes — more than twice the amount Ronaldo picked up on 233 — with the Real Madrid attacker the only non-Barcelona player in the top four.

Messi’s Barca team-mate Xavi finished third on 170, while his midfield partner Andres Iniesta was fourth with 149.

Head and shoulders above the rest: Messi

Inter Milan striker Samuel Eto’o, a key player in Barca’s romp to the treble, was next on the list with 75, 17 votes clear of Real’s former AC Milan playmaker Kaka.

Messi, who is the sixth Barca player to take the award but the first for four years since Ronaldinho, said: ‘To have the recognition of being the best player in the world is special. It’s also right that they recognised the efforts of Xavi, Andres and also Samuel. It’s well deserved that so many Barca players are up there.

‘It would have been more difficult to achieve it without Iniesta and Xavi. The prize is for all the team.’

Double act: Xavi and Iniesta

Barcelona’s Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who moved to the Nou Camp in the deal which took Eto’o to the San Siro in the summer, polled 50 for seventh, ahead of a quintet of Barclays Premier League players.

Manchester United and England striker Wayne Rooney and Chelsea forward Didier Drogba were eighth and ninth, with Liverpool midfielder Steven Gerrard completing the top 10.